A Heartfelt Thank You...

... to all of those who commented on the upsetting events of last week that culminated in death, one of humanities' most dreaded foes. Your words of support and sympathy were very comforting and helpful to me. Thank you so much!

My parents are doing OK. I cannot imagine how sad it must have been for my mom to have her birthday (which was on Sunday) take place right after this. Thankfully their friends (my brother's in-laws) took them out to eat some delicious fish in Piracicaba, the town where my brother used to live before he moved to China.

My mom told me that yesterday was their first "normal" day, when they returned to their pre-accident routine, at least in part. They went to their hydro-gymnastics class (my dad only moved gently in the water since he's still sore from the accident and he's going to have an MRI or CAT scan, I don't know exactly which, late this week to find out if he has a pinched vertebra or not), came back home, had a lighter lunch, and were very relieved that my dad's brother returned from a trip that unfortunately took place exactly during one of the hardest weeks of their lives (my dad says it only wasn't worse than the week in which my younger brother broke his leg when he was 1 year old, but that's another story).

My uncle (tio) Hugo (we pronounce it "0oogoh" in Portuguese), and whom Linton hilariously calls tio "OOvoh" (or "Uvo" -- "male" grape in Portuguese since uva, a feminine word, means grape) has been living temporarily with my parents while his apartment building is being built and getting ready for people to live in. This uncle who is a few years older than my dad has a sad story. His wife left him many years ago (almost 30 years) and he never remarried. He's also a pastor, but he worked in accounting and auditing for the church until he retired a couple of years ago. The irony of ironies is that you may remember that we built a small house in the back of our lot which is adjacent to my parents' house... so, in July our former tenant decided to leave and do you know who's renting the house now? My uncle's ex-wife! (sorry for the long digression, but I thought it was an interesting story).

Anyway, my uncle is a very level-headed, rational man (as opposed to his more emotional brother, my dad) and my mom kept wishing that he'd come back all of last week so he could help them deal with the whole situation since he's also quite knowledgeable about legislation and such things. Fortunately their friends came through for them as I knew they would since they're more like family than just mere friends.

Last night they met with the attorney who's going to deal with their situation, but I haven't talked to my mom since then. She left me an instant message on skype saying that they liked him and that he's getting specialized in cases of retired pastors like my dad or other school/church personnel who get involved in fatal accidents. Yeah, very sad, but roads in Brazil can be extremely dangerous and I don't know now, but traffic accidents used to be the leading cause of death in Brazil. Let's see what's going to happen since I don't really know how these things work in Brazil. This weekend a friend of ours told us that a similar thing happened to her sister who was driving on a highway when suddenly a cycling man crossed the road in front of her, she hit him and he died. There was a trial and she was acquitted since they concluded it wasn't her fault. My dad's situation is a bit different, but we'll see. One thing is certain, the judicial system in Brazil is extremely, painfully, slow and inefficient. :(